Voters will decide this fall who gets to work here.
Voters will decide this fall who gets to work here. City of Seattle

‘Suggested Donations’ OK for Democracy Vouchers: In last week's election roundup I reported on allegations made against District 4 candidate Shaun Scott. The socialist organizer had asked for $50 in Democracy Vouchers as a suggested, but not mandatory, donation in order to attend an upcoming town hall. The angry Facebookers over at Safe Seattle accused Scott of breaking the law because his request for the donations was “trick and misleading.”

It is illegal for candidates to trade Democracy Vouchers for any kind of payment or reward. So did Scott’s suggested donation amount to a violation? Last week an employee at Seattle’s Ethics and Elections Commission said it wasn’t clear if it was a violation. This week, Wayne Barnett, the executive director of the commission, told me that Scott had not violated the law.

“A ‘suggested donation’ doesn’t violate the law that bars people from buying or selling vouchers,” Barnett wrote in an e-mail.

Facebook’s ad ban comes into play in Ballard: Have you been paying attention to Eli Sanders’s reporting on Facebook’s ad disclosure policies in Washington? This story has implications for the world’s largest social network, and it's partly being played out in a Ballard City Council race.

Here's some background on the ad ban: There’s an old law that requires anyone running political ads in Washington state to disclose who is paying for those political ads. Sanders’s reporting found that Facebook and Google, the two largest ad companies in the country, were not complying with those disclosure rules. The Attorney General sued the tech companies, citing Sanders's reporting in The Stranger, and those companies subsequently announced they would no longer sell political ads in Washington state.

Only it appears the tech companies are not able or not interested in complying with their own ban. Sanders has been uncovering instances of campaigns running Facebook ads regardless of the ban, including in the race for the District 6 council seat. Facebook blocked one District 6 candidate, Kate Martin, from running ads, but they let a different candidate, Heidi Wills, place at least seven Facebook ads. That led to a Facebook exchange between the candidates.

Read Sanders’s post to find out what each candidate said in response to this situation, and also to learn more about how Washington’s political ad disclosure law has big implications for these tech giants.

15 council candidates are millionaires: Independent journalist Erica C. Barnett pored over financial disclosure forms and found that 15 candidates are worth at least $1 million. With $7.26 million, Cathy Tuttle, who's running for office in District 4, is the richest candidate. District 6 candidate Jay Fathi comes in second with $5.5 million, followed by District 7 candidate Don Harper with $3.8 million. District 5 incumbent Councilmember Debora Juarez is worth $2.02 million. Read Barnett’s post to see financial information about the rest of the candidates.

Here’s who might replace Quittin’ Rob Johnson: There are 11 people eligible to replace Rob Johnson on the Seattle City Council. Johnson quit the council to take a job with the new local NHL team (after he was part of the council that struck a deal worth over a billion dollars with the team).

Each eligible candidate gave a presentation on Wednesday and responded to questions from the council. You can see a video of the meeting over here.

The council will vote on the replacement candidate at 2 p.m. on Monday. Here’s a list of who could potentially be Seattle’s newest city councilmember and what they do, according to their candidate applications:

• Brooke Brod, a director of an education non-profit called Stand for Children.
• Darby Nicole DuComb, a local attorney who worked for the Seattle Attorney’s Office until January of 2017.
• Kathryn A. Gardow, a local consultant on land use and food systems.
• David A. Goldberg, a communications professional who served as the community liason for the SR 520 Bridge replacement
• Jordan N. Goldwarg, a non-profit leader with experience at Washington Immigrant Solidarity Network
• Sherae Lascelles, a former Full Tilt Ice Cream manager and community organizer with Sex Workers Outreach Project of Seattle
• Jay Lazerwitz, a practicing architect and the land use chair of the Roosevelt Neighborhood Association
• Abel Pacheco, Jr., a current city council candidate for District 4, and a strategist at a local STEM program
• Marjorie (Mari) Press, a former project manager and member of the Seattle Planning Commission
• Maritza Rivera, an operations manager at Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan’s office
• Luke Wigren, a substitute teacher in the Renton School District